burma

Several weeks after a brutal crackdown on thousands of democracy protesters across Burma, over a hundred Buddhist monks have taken part in the first public demonstration in northern Burma since the government's wave of repression.

Protesters calling for the withdrawal of British and Western troops from Iraq say they will attempt to defy a ban by police and the UK government which is set to prevent them from entering Parliament Square today, under obscure legislation from 1839.

Though the main media attention went to his apparent decision not to call an immediate general election, Prime Minister Gordon Brown today vowed to maintain "pressure for change" in Burma, ahead of demonstrations against suppressed protests in the country.

American congress persons, including Joe Pitts of Pennsylvania, are urging European countries to keep up the political and economic pressure on the dictatorship in Burma, following the brutal suppression of pro-democracy protests originally led by Buddhist monks.

With reports of hundreds of people killed by the junta in Burma, international solidarity with the pro-democracy protesters is set to continue this week in spite of the crackdown and what looks like a logjam in UN diplomacy.

These days, it can so easily feel as if religion is an anti-democratic force in our polity, writes Giles Fraser. No one votes for Bishops in the House of Lords, for example. So it's worth remembering that in this country, as indeed in many others too, religion was the nursemaid of democracy.

Pope Benedict XVI added his voice yesterday to calls for Burma's military leaders to peacefully end their crackdown on protesters demanding democracy, as demonstrators took to the streets of several capital cities across the globe to show solidarity.

Pro-democracy activists are continuing to protest on the streets of Asia as the United Nations' envoy arrives today in Burma for talks with government leaders - amid receding hopes of divisions emerging among the ruling junta.